1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a. computer implemented and/or assisted health information system for tracking and/or ensuring appropriate patient care, whereby the system facilitates client access to health professionals for confidential health advice, personalized treatment advice, personalized pharmaceutical advice and service, and personalized health benefit and account information.
2. Background of the Related Art
Health care costs currently represent a significant portion of the United States Gross National Product, and continue to rise at an exceptional pace. A significant portion of these increased costs represents the health care providers"" inability to efficiently compile and communicate health benefit and account referral information, provide guidance on prescription drug use, and administer confidential health advice relating to items such as treatment options and disease management. Accordingly, many patients are deprived of access to the most needed medical care and information, and many patients who do receive medical care and information often do not receive information tailored to patient-specific needs in an expedient and efficient manner.
We have determined that if a system were available which allowed callers to obtain patient specific medical advice, pharmaceutical instructions and guidance, referrals, and benefits information through a single point of access, callers could quickly obtain relevant information to address their questions, concerns or problems. System users/clients could also control medical costs by efficiently identifying courses of medical and pharmaceutical treatment that may benefit the patient, by providing ready access to medical and pharmaceutical guidelines, by providing efficient access to benefit and referral information, and by integrating these elements into a single administrative function so that system administration is streamlined and a single means of tracking and/or monitoring usage is available.
One prior attempt to address the health care problem is called Ask-A-Nurse, wherein trained nurses provide health care information by telephone around-the-clock. A person with a medical problem calls an 800 number and describes the problem to the nurse. The nurse uses a computer for general or diagnostic information on the ailment or complaint mentioned by the caller. The nurse may then refer the caller to a doctor from a computerized referral list for a contracting hospital or group of hospitals. A managed care option called Personal Health Advisor is similar and adds the capability for the caller to hear pre-recorded messages on health topics 24 hours a day.
Another prior health system provides a computerized service that answers health care questions and advises people in their homes. A Health Maintenance Organization (xe2x80x9cHMOxe2x80x9d) may provide this service to its members in a particular geographic area. To get advice at home, an HMO member connects a box device to a telephone and calls a toll-free 800 number. Using a keyboard that is part of the box, the user answers questions displayed on a screen of the box relating to the user""s symptoms. Depending on the answers, the user might be told to try a home remedy, be called by a nurse or doctor, or be given an appointment to be examined.
Several problems exist with these prior medical advice systems. First, the Ask-A-Nurse and Personal Health Advisor systems have high costs associated with having a nurse answer each telephone call. Second, these systems fail to include any means of providing callers with referrals, prescription refills, or medical benefit information in conjunction with the medical advice. Third, and significantly, these systems provide no means of either providing information that is tailored to a patient""s specific needs based on the patient""s medical history or updating the patient""s records based on the information provided.
Prior methods of administering confidential health advice include U.S. Pat. No. 5,660,176 to Iliff, incorporated herein by reference. Iliff is directed to a computerized medical diagnostic and treatment advice system. Referring to FIG. 1, the components of the computerized medical diagnostic and treatment advice system 100 are shown. A personal computer 102 includes a plurality of components within an enclosure 104. A plurality of telephone lines 106 interface the public telephone network 108 to the computer 102. One of telephone lines 106 is shown to be switched via network 108 to connect with a telephone 110 that is used by a person desiring medical advice (user) 112.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a conceptual view of the database files and processes of the system of FIG. 1. If the caller is the patient, a patient registration process 252 is used to register new or first-time callers. If the caller is not the patient, an assistant registration process 274 is used to register new or first-time assistants. An assisted registration process 278 is also available. A patient login process 250 and an assistant login process 272 are used to identify a patient or assistant who has previously registered into the system. An assisted login process 276 is also available.
The master patient and assistant enrollment database 260 is created at run-time by one of the registration processes 252, 274, or 278. This database 260 is read by the patient login process 250 or the assisted patient login process 276 to validate a patient""s identity at login time, and by the assistant login process 272 to validate an assistant""s identity at login time. The database 260 is essentially a master file of all registered patients and assistants indexed by their patient ID number or assistant ID number, respectively.
In Iliff, the medical diagnostic and treatment advice is provided to the general public over a telephone network. The system uses a new authoring language, interactive voice response and speech recognition technology, to enable expert and general practitioner knowledge to be encoded for access by the public. However, the system in Iliff is designed to respond to caller complaints with standard information, and provides no process for ensuring and/or designing patient-specific care, as it does not use patient history (such as known conditions or previous advice given) when providing medical advice. Further, it only responds to caller inquiries and provides no means of alerting the caller of important items, such as prescription drug refill reminders, which may not have been the subject of the caller""s inquiry. In addition, the system provides only medical advice, and includes no means for responding to callers"" pharmaceutical or health benefit inquiries.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,471,382, to Tallman et al., incorporated herein by reference, relates to a medical network management system comprising a data processing system, which includes memory that contains a patient assessment stored program and a patient database, a display, and an input means. The patient assessment stored program includes means for checking patient eligibility, means for selecting a branched chain logic algorithm for assessing a patient for an appropriate timing and type of medical care, and branched chain logic algorithms to assess the patient for an appropriate timing and level of medical care. The system in Tallman et al. includes a member assessment component wherein the patient""s risk is assessed, and a provider information component wherein the system helps the patient identify an appropriate doctor, clinic, hospital, or other provider to meet their needs. Accordingly, the system in Tallman et al. assists patients in obtaining an appropriate level of care from an appropriate provider. However, the system in Tallman is not designed to provide actual health counseling or disease management services. Further, the system in Tallman et al. does not provide the patient with prerecorded messages of health information, pharmaceutical advice and service, or health benefit information.
At the other end of the spectrum, prior methods for providing pharmaceutical advice include reference books and charts that correlate known uses of prescription drugs with medical conditions. FIGS. 3a-3b identify the methods by which this correlation may occur. FIG. 3a indicates that the method may identify a drug and list the conditions for which the drug is known to be effective. In the alternative, FIG. 3b indicates that the method may list medical conditions and identify the drugs which are known to be effective to treat each condition.
These prior methods of correlating prescription drugs and medical conditions also present several problems. First, the methods are reactive to user inputs and do not proactively alert the user of the suitability or unsuitability of particular drugs for particular conditions. Further, none of the previous systems automatically alert the user of items such as possible side effects, drug interaction effects, prescription refill reminders, or prescription renewal reminders.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,758,095 to Albaum et al., incorporated herein by reference, represents a computer-assisted method of providing pharmaceutical advice. Albaum et al. describes a system and method for ordering and prescribing drugs for a patient. The system in Albaum et al. also allows the user, typically a pharmacist, to access a database which includes current and previously-prescribed medications for individual patients. The system also contains a database of prescription drug information to help the pharmacist identify possible reactions to particular drugs.
The prior art methods such as that in Albaum et al. contain several disadvantages. First, the methods provide no means for a caller to remotely access the system and thus provide no means for a patient to obtain prerecorded health information. Further, the systems are limited to the ordering of prescription drugs and provide no means for identifying or selecting appropriate drugs or responding to patients"" medical inquiries.
Accordingly, we have determined that it is desirable to provide a method and/or system that allows clients to provide confidential health advice and disease management advice that is directly tailored to member-specific needs.
We have also determined that it is desirable to provide a method and/or system that allows members to obtain pre-recorded health-related messages at all times.
We have also determined that it is desirable to provide a method and/or system that allows members to obtain confidential pharmaceutical guidance, reminder, and alert information.
We have also determined that it is desirable to provide a method and/or system that allows the client to update member history files to include information based on the member""s call.
We have also determined that it is desirable to provide a method and/or system to provide a single, integrated means of tracking and/or monitoring client and member usage of health, pharmaceutical, and benefit account management services.
It is therefore a feature and advantage of the present invention to provide confidential health advice and disease management advice that is directly tailored to member-specific needs.
It is another feature and advantage of the present invention to provide members a means to obtain prerecorded health-related messages at all times.
It is another feature and advantage of the present invention to allow members to obtain confidential pharmaceutical guidance, reminder, and alert information.
It is another feature and advantage of the present invention to provide a method and/or system that allows the client to update member history information during and after each member call.
It is yet another feature and advantage of the present invention to provide a single, integrated means of tracking and/or monitoring client and member usage of health, pharmaceutical and account management services.
The above and other features and advantages are achieved through the use of a novel health management system as herein disclosed. In accordance with the preferred embodiment of the present invention, a computer system contains one or more databases which include member profiles, clinical information and guidelines, pharmaceutical information and guidelines, health benefit information, and optional additional information. A caller establishes communication with the system, which automatically directs the caller to an operator who provides the caller with medical, pharmaceutical, and/or health benefit advice based on an inquiry from the caller and the information stored on the system. The system may automatically alert the caller or the operator of important medical or pharmaceutical information. During the call and at the conclusion of the call, the system, or the system with the operator""s input, may update the caller""s member profile, request written materials, generate referrals, order prescriptions, and/or generate reports.
There has thus been outlined, rather broadly, the more important features of the invention in order that the detailed description thereof that follows may be better understood, and in order that the present contribution to the art may be better appreciated. There are, of course, additional features of the invention that will be described hereinafter and which will form the subject matter of the claims appended hereto.
In this respect, before explaining at least one embodiment of the invention in detail, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited in its application to the details of construction and to the arrangements of the components set forth in the following description or illustrated in the drawings. The invention is capable of other embodiments and of being practiced and carried out in various ways. Also, it is to be understood that the phraseology and terminology employed herein are for the purpose of description and should not be regarded as limiting.
As such, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the conception upon which this disclosure is based may readily be utilized as a basis for the designing of other structures, methods and systems for carrying out the several purposes of the present invention. It is important, therefore, that the claims be regarded as including such equivalent constructions insofar as they do not depart from the spirit and scope of the present invention.
Further, the purpose of the foregoing abstract is to enable the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and the public generally, and especially the scientists, engineers and practitioners in the art who are not familiar with patent or legal terms or phraseology, to determine quickly from a cursory inspection the nature and essence of the technical disclosure of the application. The abstract is neither intended to define the invention of the application, which is measured by the claims, nor is it intended to be limiting as to the scope of the invention in any way.
The scope of the invention, together with other objects of the invention, along with the various features of novelty which characterize the invention, are pointed out with particularity in the claims annexed to and forming a part of this disclosure. For a better understanding of the invention, its operating advantages and the specific objects attained by its uses, reference should be had to the accompanying drawings and descriptive matter which illustrate preferred embodiments of the invention.